[cotdt]

Is there any way to tell how many years old a pigeon is?

 

[re lee]

If not banded with a proper band showing the year of birth You really can not be sure Unless you wrote it down and have a very good memory. In the wild after young are grown You would never know

 

[links]

the bigger and crustier the waddle, and the ring around the eye. the older the pigeon is. every three years the waddle double in size. at least in my pigeons they do.

 

[altgirl35]

ive seen the same in the older pigeons that have some my way, sometimes thier feet get more scaley looking too

 

[george simon]

the bigger and crustier the waddle, and the ring around the eye. the older the pigeon is. every three years the waddle double in size. at least in my pigeons they do.

Hi LINKS,There are different breeds of pigeons that do not get larger wattles. My Italian owls have a very fine wattle and that is what is called for in the show standard. With racing homers if one breeds a family aroung a hen the cock birds in that family will over a period of time get what is called a heney lookGEORGE

 

[ND Cooper]

For me, it really wouldn't matter much.
A healthy pigeon is what would make the difference.
You could always ask them though!

 

[YaSin11]

Cotdt,
Good Q! I dont have an answer, sorry, but thanks for bringing it up. Some fanciers here in Bangladesh 'count feathers'....I'm not sure how it works. Does anyone here know about 'counting feathers' to tell the age?...Thanks in advance, YaSin

 

[links]

thanks george. thats what i meant, wattle in my homing pigeons double in size every three years. and my loft revolves around one hen. i speak only of homers.

 

[sreeshs]

Cotdt,
Good Q! I dont have an answer, sorry, but thanks for bringing it up. Some fanciers here in Bangladesh 'count feathers'....I'm not sure how it works. Does anyone here know about 'counting feathers' to tell the age?...Thanks in advance, YaSin

That I think would be counting the primary feathers while in the moulting stage for the weining youngs, that woun't help in grown up pigeons.

 

[Nazmul]

So what is the conclusion ?? It is not possible to tell the exact or approx age of a pigeon ???

 

[John_D]

If you put two adult pigeons side by side then you may be able to tell which is the older, but you cannot tell what age an adult pigeon is.

I have a 9 year old hen who looks no different to when she was a 1 year old hen.

 

[blacksheep]

Interesting.

Here I thought the size of the waddle had to do with the bird and weather or not they carried the gene for a larger waddle.

I really like the look of a bird with a larger waddle. Someone on here must have picture proof of this?

If so please share. Pic of yb and size of waddle and a later pic of the old bird and the increase in size of the waddle.

Sorry, off topic.

 

[John_D]

Not at all off topic, Blacksheep, because one view is that the size of the wattle is (in homers, anyway) a guide to age, whilst others may not think it relevant.

Another strange thing is, looking at our rescue birds, coloration on red bars. I've noticed that with our male red bars, as they age so they develop black 'flecks' in their feathering. It's just a few at first, but one who is now over 10 years old has dozens of them. Doesn't seem to happen with our hens. Still doesn't tell us just how old they actually are, but it's an indication (or coincidence?).

 

[Nalin]

Young birds drop their 10th primary feather at 6th week old and then drop the following feather in every 1-2 weeks time, depending on their flying.

https://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S2175-91462016000100007